Snowball Fight on Movie Night
by sociallyawkwardpenguin
Summary: Jane and Maura get into a snowball fight while shoveling snow at Maura's house on their usual movie night. Two achy hands and a deep conversation later, Jane and Maura finally realize the biggest risk to losing each other isn't revealing their feelings, it's continuing to hide them. A quick Rizzles one shot based on several Tumblr prompts.


"Jane?"

"Jane?!"

"JANE!"

Maura's cries are becoming increasingly desperate as she tries to make her way through the hip-deep pile of snow that separates her from Jane.

"Oh Jane! Jane are you all right? Please be all right," Maura begs, finally reaching the woman sprawled out on her back against the snow, an untossed snowball still in her gloved hand.

"Jane, please, open your eyes," Maura tries again as she runs her fingers over Jane's cold, wet forehead. "I'm so sorry. I didn't think I threw the snowball that hard, and the trajectory wasn't one which would have-"

Jane opens her eyes, and laughs, unable to contain herself any longer at the doctor's reaction. She had figured anyone with a medical degree could have easily seen how fake her 'injury' was. Her heart flutters at the concern Maura shows as she now hovers over Jane in the snow.

Relief floods over Maura's features as soon as Jane laughs, and the brunette takes this as her cue, squashing her unthrown snowball against the top of the honey blonde's hat covered head. She simultaneously grabs another handful of snow, surreptitiously checking to make sure it isn't yellow, and firmly shoves it into Maura's mouth, which is currently open as she squawks in indignation at Jane's ruse.

The normally ladylike doctor is now sputtering, spitting snow out of her mouth in the most unladylike way Jane has ever seen her act, but the doctor will not be outdone. While she has Jane fascinated with her expectorating, she grabs a handful of snow herself and dumps it unceremoniously on Jane's face before getting up and trying to hustle away from the still-prone detective.

Jane's not having any of it though. She's been knocked down enough times in life to be able to get back on her feet far faster than Maura, who is still trying to wade back to her side of the mountain of snow that had been between them as they had shoveled and their snowball fight had ensued.

By the time Maura is just a yard away, Jane is back up on her feet and diving for her medical examiner companion. She takes the blonde down with a satisfying 'umpf" and delights as she hears the woman beneath her giggle as she rolls herself over, smiling up mischieviously at the detective above her.

If Jane had any time to think about it, she would realize that this is exactly where she wants Maura to be. Underneath her and smiling up at her, with, wait- is that lust in her eyes?

But Jane doesn't have time to think because Maura is using Jane's own tactics against her, shoving a handful of snow into her face and using the technique Jane has taught her in self-defense lessons to roll Jane off of her. Maura is back up and running as Jane is gathering an absurdly large snowball to toss when the front door to Maura's house opens and Angela bellows out.

"Girls! What are you doing? What happened to shoveling?" Angela asks, causing the mood to burst around them like a pin piercing a water balloon. Angela doesn't wait for an answer. "Come in, I made hot cocoa and started up the fireplace so you can warm up."

Maura glances at Jane and shrugs, brushing the snow off of her coat and pants as she walks toward her front door. Jane catches up from just a few steps behind her and dumps the snowball over Maura's head before bolting into the house, happy to have gotten in the last shot in their snowball fight.

Jane is already in the front entryway, removing her snow-covered boots. Maura walks in and gently removes her hat, hanging it on a hook by the door. She looks at the hat appreciatively as she starts to unzip her coat. Angela had knitted her that hat several years prior and even though it doesn't match anything she owns, she still wears it. She particularly enjoys wearing it on days like today. She feels it brings her closer to Jane, even though it was Jane's mother that had made it for her, and not Jane herself.

It's days like this one that make Maura thankful for Jane's family. Angela is probably the closest thing to a real mother that she will ever have, despite having both a birth mother and an adoptive mother. The mother that had raised Maura had quite the creative streak, but she had never made anything especially for Maura, and Maura sighs wistfully at the thought. And the mother that hadn't raised her had taken more from Maura than she'd given her. No, when it comes to mothers, Angela comes closest to the mark.

Jane watches Maura as she stares sadly at the hat Angela had made for her. She understands the sigh Maura lets out without having to ask. Unwilling to let the past (or her overbearing mother) ruin the mood from earlier, she nudges Maura gently with her elbow.

"You're not really going to let me get away with getting the last shot in, are you?" Jane asks as she picks a chunk of snow from Maura's frozen hair. "Somehow I don't think that's the end of our snowball fight."

"Of course not," Maura boasts, fully aware of Jane's attempt to bring her out of her reverie. It's moments like these when Maura loves Jane most. Moments when Jane just knows how to save her from herself, and bring her back to the warm, safe, happy place that Jane Rizzoli creates whenever she is nearby. "You best be on your guard, Detective," Maura says with a smile that is meant to be playful but comes off as coy. Maura can't help but enjoy Jane's reactive squirm.

"Well," Jane breathes, trying to steer herself into safer waters. "It's supposed to be movie night and it's my turn to pick the movie. Buuuuut… because I am such a great person, I'm going to let _you _pick the movie instead."

"How magnanimous of you," Maura says with a sly grin. "However, that does not absolve you from the fact that you dumped a bucket's worth of snow on my head just now."

"I figured as much, Google Mouth," Jane says, playing along. "Let's go drink some hot chocolate while you come up with my punishment."

Maura can't help but laugh at Jane's waggling eyebrows as she follows the detective into the kitchen. Angela had set out two mugs and left a pot of rich, homemade hot cocoa on the stove for them before returning to the guesthouse to care for TJ. Angela is watching TJ while Tommy is out with a snow removal crew, picking up the extra cash to help support himself and his son.

"My Ma makes the best hot cocoa," Jane brags, pouring some into each cup. "None of that powdered stuff I usually make. She goes professional with real cream and melted chocolate on the stove. You're gonna love this."

Maura accepts the mug gratefully from Jane, opting to take a sip of the rich, velvety liquid instead of reminding Jane that this is not the first time she has had Angela's hot cocoa, nor is it the first time Jane has bragged to her about it.

She would gladly listen to Jane's stories a million times over if it just meant having Jane there to tell them to her.

They sit in companionable silence as they sip their drinks, each lost in their own thoughts.

"If you don't mind, I'm going to take a hot shower to work out some of the kinks in my muscles," Jane says as she puts down her empty mug. "Then we can think about dinner and a movie, if you want."

Eager for her own hot shower, Maura agrees. "There are pajamas that you left here up in the guest room dresser. If you put your wet clothes in the hamper in my bedroom closet, I'll make sure they're washed and dried for you before you leave in the morning."

Jane smiles her thanks at Maura as she heads toward the guest bath. Neither one of them has to acknowledge the fact that they each assumed Jane would just stay the night.

Because it was completely normal for best friends to stay the night. More than once a week.

And leave their pajamas at one another's homes.

And have their mother live in their best friend's guesthouse.

And have their best friend look up at them with lust in their eyes as they are pinned down in the snow.

Right?

Jane decides, not for the first time, that this is all too much to think about. She knows that she and Maura crossed the line from friendship into something more years ago. It's just that neither one of them has attempted to define it, and it's simply too much for Jane to puzzle through on her own.

Instead, she grabs a towel and hops in the shower, reveling in the instantly warm water and the dual showerheads and wishing, not for the first time, that she lived in a home with a shower like this one.

Or that she could live anywhere Maura lives, really.

When she emerges a short time later, Maura is still in the shower. Jane sneaks into Maura's bedroom and puts her clothes in the hamper inside of Maura's gigantic walk in closet before quickly making her way back out. The last thing she wants is Maura walking out of her bathroom with just a towel wrapped around her wet, naked body.

Or maybe that's the first thing she wants.

Confused, Jane makes her way downstairs and turns on the television, giving herself time to think and pull herself together.

She's been plagued with thoughts just like that one lately, more than ever before, and half of her shivers in delight while the other half of her shivers in fear.

Jane Rizzoli takes down some of the meanest, most dangerous criminals to walk this earth, and she does it fearlessly. But when it comes to the prospect of driving Maura Isles out of her life, Jane is nothing but fear.

She simply cannot not let that happen. So she buries her feelings and loves from afar. Except for moments like today's, when Maura was pinned underneath her. Acting like it was the most natural thing in the world.

Maura hears Jane enter her room to drop her clothes in the hamper, and she silently berates herself for lingering under the hot water in the shower for so long. There would have been nothing better than walking into her bedroom with just a towel wrapped around her hair and catching Jane by surprise.

She bets Jane even thought the same thing, but being the more prudish of the pair, Jane probably pictured Maura returning to her bedroom with the towel wrapped around her body.

Maura smiles at the thought.

That would have been a great way to finish what they'd started during their snowball fight earlier in the day. Maura had just been ready to lean up and kiss Jane when she caught Angela peering out the kitchen window at the two of them. Knowing they'd been seen, Maura had decided to simply keep up with the snowball fight. Angela had called them back into the house moments later.

Maura runs her fingers over her lips, sad that she didn't get her chance to finally kiss Jane that afternoon.

She knows Jane feels the same way she does. She knows Jane wants her as much as she wants Jane. Maura is simply terrified of moving too quickly and scaring Jane off completely.

She cannot lose Jane.

But that doesn't mean she can't keep trying to push them in the right direction, however slowly she has to go.

Maura dresses in a warm pair of flannel pajamas, an outfit that, prior to meeting Jane, would never have made it into one of Maura's drawers. But the flannel pants and worn cotton t-shirt are strikingly similar to what Jane likes to wear, and they are quite comfortable. She bought them originally after telling herself that if she dressed a little more like Jane when they were alone together, it might make Jane a little more comfortable around her.

She promptly broke out in hives. Although not entirely untrue, the real reason Maura had bought the pajamas was because they reminded her so much of Jane that she couldn't resist them, much the same way that she cannot resist the brunette currently sitting on her sofa.

Jane smiles up at Maura as she enters the room, holding up the takeout menu. "I thought Thai for dinner, if they're still delivering in this weather," she says.

"Sounds good to me. Though I have one of those frozen pizza things in the chest freezer in the basement if you'd prefer that."

"Maybe that's better, so some poor guy doesn't have to schlep out in this snow," Jane responds.

Maura loves that she thinks of people other than herself like that. Maybe it's the cop in her. Or maybe she's just that kindhearted.

It doesn't matter. Whatever the reason, she loves Jane for it.

"I'll preheat the oven and go get the pizza. Can you pull up Netflix?" Maura asks.

"Sure, what did you decide you wanted to watch?"

"You'll see," Maura replies playfully as she disappears into the basement.

Jane knows based on Maura's tone that the movie is not going to be one that she enjoys. Exhausted by the hours of snow shoveling and the subsequent snowball fight, Jane consoles herself with the idea that she can sleep through whichever documentary Maura has chosen.

Little does she know that there will be no sleeping. Not for that night.

Maura comes back and leaves the pizza by the oven while it preheats. She glances over to Jane, who is sitting on the sofa, distractedly rubbing her hands. They hurt on cold days, but the shoveling and snowball fight didn't help them either.

"Do they hurt?" Maura asks softly, trying not to startle Jane, but managing to make her jump anyway. She'd heard Maura come back upstairs, but when did she get so close?

"Yeah, the cold makes them ache," Jane answers quietly. Maura is the only one that she would ever admit that to. That Charles Hoyt lives on in her scars and her aches and pains.

"Here," Maura says, gently taking Jane's left hand between her own. "Let me."

Maura starts out by rubbing soft circles on Jane's palm with her thumbs before slowly increasing the pressure. They sit in peaceful silence for a few minutes, and as Maura lets go of Jane's left hand and takes her right between her own, Jane finally speaks.

"I miss playing the piano," she says quietly. "He asked me, that day, if I missed playing the piano. And I told him my hands were good as new. I was lying, and I think he knew it."

Maura frowns, wondering where all this is coming from. "He's dead, Jane. He can't hurt you anymore."

"He lives on in my scars and…" Jane trails off.

"And in your nightmares?" Maura asks helpfully.

"No, I was going to say, in all the things I can't do anymore," Jane sighs and goes to take her hand out of Maura's, but Maura holds tight.

"I'm not done with this one," Maura says with a nod toward the hand she's still massaging. "He's dead, and he has no more power over you. Frankly, I don't think he ever held any power over you, Jane. And that's why he was so fixated on you. You were the only one of his victims he couldn't break, no matter how hard he tried."

"He did break me, Maur." They are whispering, their heads close together as Maura works the tension out of Jane's hands.

"Not the way he wanted to, Jane. Yes, he left scars, both physical and emotional. But _he did not break you._ And you can take satisfaction in knowing that. He went to his grave a defeated man. It's okay to take solace in that."

"I almost lost you, that day, in the prison infirmary," Jane whispers, looking up to catch Maura's eye. "I don't think I could have lived with that," she says seriously.

Maura looks back at Jane, her gaze filled with caring adoration. "Like I couldn't have lived with losing you that day at the precinct, with Marino and his men. Or any of the other times your life has been in danger."

"Yeah but," Jane stumbles, looking away at the fireplace before looking back at Maura. "But I'm supposed to protect you," she says hoarsely, and then takes her hand from Maura's and gently runs her fingers over the scar on Maura's neck that only she seems to know is there.

Maura's eyes flutter shut at Jane's touch. It takes her a moment to collect herself before she can respond to Jane.

"You do, Jane. But you don't have to be my guardian angel. Not if it's too much for you. And you could let me protect you sometimes too. There's no dishonor in that."

Jane smiles as she takes Maura's hands into her own, rubbing her thumb over Maura's. "I'll always protect you. To my dying day," she rasps.

Jane catches Maura's eye, and knows this is the moment. The moment when she can just put it all out there. The moment when she can lean in and kiss Maura and have Maura kiss her back. The moment when they can define whatever this is, that somewhere between more than friends and lovers.

She takes a deep breath and starts to lean in, a swoop in her stomach when she sees Maura close her eyes in anticipation.

And then the oven beeps loudly behind them, startling them back into reality.

They jump apart, like two teenagers that have been caught doing something they weren't supposed to be doing. They look up at each other quickly and then both look away, embarrassed and terrified.

"That's the oven," Maura says, more for a break to the awkward silence than anything else. She knows Jane knows it's the oven.

"Yeah," Jane mutters.

"I'll just…" Maura trails off, backing toward the kitchen. "I'll just put the pizza in the oven."

"Okay," Jane answers, the frustration evident in her voice.

Jane gets up and stands near the fireplace, desperately trying to figure out where to go from there. She hears Maura fiddling with the cardboard box that contains the frozen pizza. She hears Maura rip the strip off the box that unseals it, and it's like the sound of one of the toy cars she had as a child. The car that she inserted the long plastic pull tab into, and yanked it out, and then the car would shoot off across the floor, leaving her to chase after it.

Jane knows she has to chase after this.

It's now or never, she realizes, and she will not let her greatest fear come true. She will not lose Maura Isles.

Jane stalks across the living room and into the kitchen, where Maura is taking an inordinate amount of time putting the pizza on a cookie sheet, lost in her own thoughts.

"Maura," Jane says, right next to Maura. Maura looks up at her with unshed tears in her eyes.

"Maur," she says again, quieter. She cups Maura's cheek in her hand, and runs her thumb over the tear that has started to make its way down her cheek.

"Jane, please," Maura begs, and Jane realizes that Maura is not asking her to back away. She's begging Jane to finish what they'd started on the couch.

So she does. She leans in and kisses Maura softly, and Maura sighs, wrapping her arms around Jane's waist.

Encouraged, Jane curls her fingers in Maura's hair and deepens the kiss. Maura walks Jane backward, toward the oven, until Jane's back bumps up against it. Maura lets go of Jane's waist just long enough to power off the oven, and then pulls Jane even tighter to herself.

"What about your pizza?" Jane murmurs against Maura's lips.

"Not hungry," Maura murmurs back, swiping her tongue along Jane's bottom lip.

"Mh," Jane moans. "You taste better anyway. What about your movie though?"

Maura pulls away from Jane and starts to laugh.

"What?" Jane asks, absolutely flabbergasted that Maura would stop kissing her to _laugh _at her.

"I was going to make you watch 'Attack of the Clowns VI'," she gasps, nearly doubled over with laughter.

"What?! Why? You know I hate clowns!"

"I know, and I figured I'd make you watch it under the guise of you getting in the last toss in the snowball fight, but with the ulterior motive of you getting scared of the movie and snuggling up to me." Maura stops laughing long enough to blush. "I would do anything to have you close to me, in case you haven't noticed."

"_Maura!_" Jane exclaims, scandalized. "That's… that's…"

"Ingenious?" Maura asks hopefully.

"Not quite what I was going for, but okay," Jane says, crooking a finger at Maura.

Grinning, Maura gladly steps back into Jane's arms and kisses her again.

* * *

**A/N:**

Thanks for the prompts, itstartwithasmile, MC-Rizzles and Whatsitcalledagain! I hope you can recognize them in here. They're not all exactly as you prompted me with them, but this is what my muse came up with. I hope you will enjoy them nonetheless. I have a few more prompts/asks left in my inbox. I hope to try my hand at them after the holiday. Best wishes to all of you out there for a safe and happy holiday season, and a 2014 filled with good health, good friends, and good fortune. :)


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